A recent Belmont Club article, Fortress Unvanquishable Save for Sacnoth, examines the blogging phenomenon:
Once the software and infrastructure to self-publish was in place, it was natural that analytical cells, or groups of cells would take inputs from other parts of the system and process them. The result was “instant punditry”, which was nothing more than the public exchange of analysis on any subject — politics, culture and war just happened to be the three most popular. It enabled lawyers to offer opinions on law; military men on things military; scientists on things scientific. And suddenly the journalistic opinion editors found themselves at an increasing disadvantage. While individual bloggers might not have the journalistic experience of the newspaper professionals, they had the inestimable edge of being experts, sometimes the absolute authorities in their respective fields.
When I saw the article’s title, I assumed it was a reference to something I should know, and I was right. It’s the title to a short story, written in 1910 by Lord Dunsany (1878-1957), one of the very first modern fantasy writers.
The connection to “blogging versus the mainstream media” isn’t particularly direct.